1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a toll collecting system, and more particularly, to a system for collecting tolls from vehicles on a toll road such as an expressway using a lock-type management.
2. Related Art
Contemporary toll collecting systems for toll collection of vehicles on toll roads such as expressways may be classified as a lock type or a non-lock type of system according to a particular management pattern. A lock-type toll collecting system relates to toll collection of a vehicle at the toll gate where the value of the toll is determined according to the type of vehicle and the distance traveled along the road. A non-lock type toll collecting system relates to toll collection determined according to only the type of the vehicle. Different vehicle classification systems may be used to determine the type of vehicle on the road, such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,794,966 for Automatic Vehicle Classification And Ticket Issuing System issued to Platzman, U.S. Pat. No. 3,872,283 for Vehicle Identification Method And Apparatus issued to Smith et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,914,733 for System Including A Pressure Switch For Counting Axles And Classifying Vehicles issued to Viracola, U.S. Pat. No. 3,927,389 for Device For Determining, During Operation, The Category Of A Vehicle According To A Pre-Established Group Of Categories issued to Neeloff, U.S. Pat. No. 4,789,941 for Computerized Vehicle Classification System issued to Nunberg, U.S. Pat. No. 4,947,353 for Automatic Vehicle Detecting System issued to Quinlan et al., and U.S. Pat. No. 5,392,034 for Vehicle Classification System Using Profile issued to Kuwagaki.
On toll roads for vehicles on which the toll depends upon the distance traveled along the road of traditional lock-type toll collecting systems, the collection of tolls requires an attendant at each toll gate of the toll road. Usually when a vehicle is about to enter a toll road, the driver of the vehicle must stop at an entrance toll gate to pick up a ticket for toll collection upon exit. Sometimes, an attendant is required at the toll gate to input information relating to the type of vehicle into a ticket machine for ticket issuance which the attendant hands to the driver. Typically the ticket may be a magnetic recorded pass or can contain punched holes in which information such as the date, the toll gate number, and the type of vehicle is encoded. Upon receipt of the ticket, the driver can enter the toll road with his vehicle.
When the driver wishes to exit from the toll road, he or she must stop at an exit toll gate and hand the ticket to an attendant at the toll gate. The attendant then inserts the ticket into a card reader which deciphers the information encoded in the punched holes of the ticket or reads the magnetic strip for toll calculation. The attendant must manually collect the toll from the driver of the vehicle before the driver can exit from the toll road. Since the toll collecting process requires human attendants, the time required to collect the toll for each vehicle is extremely exhaustive, costly and frequently causes traffic backups on the toll road near the entrances and exits. The traffic jams in turn cause pollution because of the amount of carbon monoxide that is produced, and the amount of fuel that is consumed by thousands and thousands of vehicles that must come to a full stop, stop and go, and then accelerate for the duration.
In recent years, electronics have been used for more cost efficient and reliable toll collections such as those disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,963,723 for Automatic Toll Collector For Toll Roads issued to Masada, U.S. Pat. No. 5,101,200 for Fast Lane Credit Card issued to Swett, U.S. Pat. No. 5,204,675 for Toll Collecting System For A Vehicle issued to Sekine, U.S. Pat. No. 5,422,473 for Vehicle Security System And Automatic Roadway Toll Charging System issued to Kamata, U.S. Pat. No. 5,451,758 for Automatic Non-Computer Network No-Stop Collection Of Expressway Tolls By Magnetic Cards And Method issued to Jesadamont, U.S. Pat. No. 5,602,375 for Automatic Debiting System Suitable For Free Lane Traveling issued to Sunahara et al. Many recent toll collecting systems use an on-board unit installed in the vehicle for toll collection without stopping the vehicle at the toll gate by way of radio communication equipment installed at the entrance/exit toll gate. However, I have observed that the on-board unit must be installed in the vehicle, and the efficiency of the toll gate lane is lowered if there are few vehicles equipped with the on-board units.